Chapter 426: Going with the Momentum

「November 2nd.」

The third day since Jiang Miao returned to Shanmei.

A little after seven in the morning, he and Shuya were taking a walk on Yandun Mountain Farm.

On the mountain terraces, which had been divided into four levels, the first batch of grafted Monthong durian from old branches had already blossomed. Although the Monthong durian branches had lost their leaves, the canopies of the genetically modified Kapok trees in the center were still lush and green.

Even though the cold air from the North had arrived relatively early this year, the weather in the south, especially here in Lingnan, was still very warm and humid.

The genetically modified Kapok trees themselves were evergreens, and they were frantically accumulating nutrients in preparation for the Monthong durians to bear fruit next year.

From a biological classification perspective, the genetically modified Kapok trees were the hosts, while the Monthong durians were the parasites.

Shuya observed the durian flowers closely. “The durian flowers look a lot like Kapok flowers, just smaller and pale yellow. Kapok flowers are larger and fiery red.”

The eight lateral branches extending from the main trunk of the genetically modified Kapok trees had all been grafted with Monthong durian. With a plentiful supply of nutrients, these old durian branches had grown from being as thick as two fingers to as thick as three.

To reduce nutrient consumption, the farm workers were already thinning the flowers by hand. Since this was the first year of flowering, each branch would only be allowed to support one durian. Therefore, this thinning process involved removing all other flower clusters, leaving only one.

The remaining durian flower cluster had about 8 to 15 blossoms. After they were pollinated and turned into small fruitlets, the fruit would be thinned as well, leaving only the best one on each branch.

Not all the durian flowers were blooming at once. Some of the unopened flower buds looked like little, unripe peaches.

On the stamens and pistils of the bloomed flowers, quite a few little bees were already hard at work.

Durian flowers are hermaphroditic, containing both a pistil and stamens. However, to prevent self-pollination, the pistil and stamens within the same flower do not mature simultaneously. This gives the durian tree a long flowering period of one to two months.

In fact, some durian varieties or those in certain regions have two flowering seasons a year: a summer season from June to August, and an autumn-winter season from August to December.

Domestically, conditions are typically suitable for only one flowering per year. However, because the genetically modified Kapok trees provided an abundant supply of nutrients to the old durian branches, these grafted durians could also flower twice a year.

But considering the issue of nutrient accumulation, and the fact that the subtropical monsoon climate’s water and heat conditions were ultimately inferior to a tropical climate, Jiang Miao did not allow these grafted durians to bear fruit twice a year.

Forcing the trees to produce two crops a year under less-than-ideal water and heat conditions would reduce the yield of each harvest and lower the quality of the fruit.

This characteristic of flowering twice a year could actually be stimulated with growth hormones and specific nutrients to achieve regular flowering throughout the year. This would facilitate year-round fruiting and a constant supply of durians.

However, the first-generation genetically modified Kapok trees had poor controllability, making it nearly impossible for them to flower between February and April each year. This created a small gap in availability.

Fortunately, the grafted durians at the Qiongzhou Branch were using second-generation genetically modified Kapok trees as rootstock. Their controllability was better, and combined with Qiongzhou’s warmer climate compared to Shanmei, they could basically achieve flowering twelve months a year.

After strolling for half an hour, the two passed through a valley in the middle of Yandun Mountain and returned to the area around Nanhu Reservoir.

Not far from Nanhu Reservoir was the experimental planting base on the eastern foot of Magong Mountain, managed by the Scientific Research Division.

As the sun rose over the mountains and sea, the cold morning dew evaporated.

After changing into a set of work clothes and bidding farewell to Shuya, Jiang Miao went to the experimental planting area.

An experimental field, designed to mimic a sandy environment, was planted with a large expanse of Immortal Soybeans.

For the past few months, Jiang Miao had been researching new varieties of the Hevea Plant and genetically modified rootstock.

After inspecting the dozen or so experimental new Hevea Plant seedlings planted beneath the Immortal Soybeans, he began to jot down some notes in his notebook.

There were three main directions for cultivating new varieties of the Hevea Plant.

One was high yield.

Another was rapid growth.

And the last was composition.

High yield and rapid growth were self-explanatory: the goal was to make the Hevea Plant’s root tubers larger and larger, with an ever-increasing rubber content, while shortening the growth cycle.

Through gene screening and induced mutation, they had already obtained over a dozen high-yield, fast-growing varieties.

The Hevea Plants growing here beneath the soybeans were part of the experimental cultivation of those dozen-plus varieties.

The yield of these new varieties was quite good. Their root tubers could reach 2 to 3 kilograms each, with a rubber content between 10% and 20%. The yield per mu could reach about 4 tons.

Besides these high-yield, fast-growing varieties, Jiang Miao went to another experimental field where another dozen or so Hevea Plant varieties were being grown. The characteristics of these varieties, however, were not high yield or rapid growth, but rather disease resistance, drought tolerance, cold hardiness, and auxiliary component content.

The reason for cultivating two distinct populations of new varieties was for hybridization.

Why do so many breeding companies favor hybridization? The reason is that seeds from hybridized crops cannot be saved for replanting. If they are, the offspring will exhibit trait segregation and gradually lose their hybrid vigor.

This included the Immortal Soybeans. Jiang Miao was already working on hybridization, planning to develop a more suitable second-generation hybrid Immortal Bean. The goal was to further control the outflow of seedlings.